Dear friends,

The year has begun with multiple events in London: a commemoration of the criminal killings of 272 people in the Brumadinho tailings dam disaster in Brazil in 2019, a picket of the Science Museum over its sponsorship by coal mining company Adani, and a General Meeting of BHP at which shareholders accepted the company’s proposal to end its dual-listed structure and, consequently, its London AGMs. (LMN representatives were the lone voices speaking out against this diminution of the company’s accountability to those whose lives and livelihoods it ruins. The company will retain its listing on the London Stock Exchange but be a purely Australian entity and only hold AGMs there.)

There have been some welcome developments recently, from our point of view.

The National Contact points of the OECD in Australia, Switzerland and the UK have decided to investigate complaints against Anglo American, BHP and Glencore for human rights and environmental violations around the Cerrejon Coal Mine in Colombia. Glencore has recently completed its cut-price buy-out of the other two multinationals’ share of the mine, and the OECD decision may help stop Anglo American and BHP completely evading responsibility for all the damage done in the twenty years they have been involved in the mine.

The US government has cancelled leases for Antofagasta’s Twin Metals copper project in Minnesota.

The Serbian government has annulled its decree on the spatial plan for Rio Tinto’s Jadar lithium mine and processing plant in the face of massive public protests.

Rio Tinto has at last started discussions with local communities about making good the damage done by its Panguna copper-gold mine in Bougainville. The film Ophir, about the resistance to this mine, has won multiple awards.

As well as reporting on these below, we also include other recent news and some older pieces, including about our activities around COP26, which we were unable to include in our December mailout because of technical problems with our website.

Every good wish for 2022!

Richard Solly, Co-ordinator, London Mining Network.

In this mailout

Take action!

Ask your MP to back a Business, Human Rights and Environment Act

Tell the Science Museum: listen to Indigenous people and drop Adani!

Event

Post-Extractive Futures

Recent events in London, and related news

Drop Adani! Picket of Science Museum, 26 January

Remembering the Brumadinho disaster, 25 January

BHP votes to end dual-listed structure, axe London AGMs – and other news of BHP

Other news

1) Day of Action against mining in Portugal, 28 January 2022

2) News about Cerrejon Coal

3) News about Antofagasta

4) Rio Tinto in the news

5) Chile: the advance of the toxic mountains

6) Peru: the damage done by Antamina

7) Bullish investors add $90bn to top 50 biggest mining companies

8) IndustriALL joins working group to develop mining standard

9) A humble TB treatment centre weathers the Covid storm

10) Latin American Church groups unite around demand for a post-extractivist economy

11) Fossil Free Careers

12) People’s Land Policy webinars

13) LMN at COP26

Take action!

Ask your MP to back a Business, Human Rights and Environment Act

We are calling for new legislation to make UK companies ensure that their activities do not put human rights or our common home at risk. Please stand with human rights defenders who are under threat right now, by urgently sending an email to your MP and asking them to call for a new Business, Human Rights and Environment Act.

Tell the Science Museum: listen to Indigenous people and drop Adani!

Late last year leaders from indigenous communities in Australia, India and Indonesia warned that the museum’s new agreement with Adani is legitimising its “destructive coal expansion activities” and that “Indigenous communities in all these countries are experiencing land-grabs, repression, the destruction of sacred lands, pollution of air, land and water and, of course, the worsening impacts of climate change exacerbated by burning coal.” Write to the museum now to urge them to break their relationship with Adani.

Event

Post-Extractive Futures

Join War on Want for ‘Post-Extractive Futures’ (1-3 February, starting at 4pm GMT each day); a series of online workshops looking at how we move beyond our current political and economic systems — which are based on the unsustainable extraction of natural resources and the exploitation of people. The sessions will be guided by artists, activists and communities from Brazil, Colombia, Haiti, North Macedonia, Puerto Rico, and South Africa.

Drop Adani! Picket of Science Museum, 26 January

Tell the Science Museum: listen to Indigenous people and drop Adani!

Just days before COP 26, the Science Museum announced plans for a new ‘Energy Revolution’ gallery, to be sponsored by the Indian conglomerate Adani, which has significant interests in coal mining and coal-fired power. Adani is responsible for violating Indigenous peoples’ rights in India, Australia and Indonesia and representatives of these communities have called on the museum to listen to them and drop Adani.

The Science Museum must Drop Adani!

The London Science Museum has announced Adani will sponsor a major new energy gallery. Adani’s coal operations are devastating Indigenous peoples’ lands in India, Australia and Indonesia. The Science Museum must listen to Indigenous people and DROP ADANI!

South Asia Solidarity Group Statement on Adani

The UK’s Science Museum in London has announced plans for a new ‘Energy Revolution’ gallery that is going to be sponsored by Adani Group. South Asia Solidarity Group, along with Culture Unstained, Survival International, London Mining Network, UKSCN London, Market Forces, XR Hammersmith and Fulham, Tipping Point UK, Coal Action Network, Scientists for XR and other human rights and activists groups are calling for the Science Museum to drop all of its association with the Indian conglomerate.

Remembering the Brumadinho disaster, 25 January

Remembering Vale’s Victims in Brumadinho

January 2022 marks three years since the collapse of Vale’s dam in Brumadinho. This preventable disaster claimed the lives of 272 victims. Families who lost their loved ones are still fighting to see justice after what was done – while Vale continues to make huge profits, it is also attempting to overturn a court order to pay compensation to the families of 131 victims.

Brumadinho: 3 years on, families of outsourced workers who died still struggle for compensation

The outsourcing of workers imposed by the mining sector has worsened after the “Labour Reform” of Temer and Bolsonaro. Today, more than 50% of workers in the sector are outsourced. This represents fewer rights, more precarious work and greater vulnerability in extreme cases that require reparation.

Three years after Brumadinho tragedy, justice and accountability still elude the victims

Last year, in response to a civil suit brought against Vale by the workers’ union Sindicato Metabase Brumadinho, a labour court ordered Vale to pay R$1million (US$200,000) compensation to the families of Vale employees. The disaster killed 270 people, but the action only benefits the families of 131 workers directly hired by Vale and does not include subcontracted workers.

Investor Action to Target Companies Not Implementing Global Industry Standard on Tailings

On the third anniversary of the Brumadinho disaster, that killed 270 people when a mine waste facility (tailings dam) collapsed at a Vale mine site in Brazil, investors published the names of companies that have committed to implement a new Global Industry Standard intended to significantly improve safety across the mining sector.

Brazil prosecutors order Vale to shore up 18 mining dams after heavy rains

Brazilian prosecutors in the state of Minas Gerais said that 18 tailings dams at mines run by Vale require some work to guarantee their safety following heavy rains in recent months.

BHP votes to end dual-listed structure, axe London AGMs – and other news of BHP

BHP cuts and runs from London, ‘not with a bang, but a whimper’

BHP’s decision to stop holding AGMs in London does indeed represent a diminution in its accountability to the communities affected by its operations. It is another example of the behaviour described in our 2020 Cut and Run report. On multiple occasions, BHP’s operations have caused enormous ecological and social damage and the company has found some face-saving excuse to pull out, leaving others, at some stage in the future, to attempt to make good the damage. This is what it did at Ok Tedi, Indomet and Cerrejon. Now it has cut and run from London; and it did so so easily, so quietly, and with so little apparent thought for the impact on communities affected by its operations.

Olympic Dam to ramp up after major smelter works

BHP has completed a $500 million revamp of its Olympic Dam smelter and is starting to ramp up copper processing again after one of the lowest quarters of production since it took over South Australia’s largest mine in 2005.

BHP back to Africa with Tanzania nickel investment

BHP has committed to invest $100 million in a huge nickel project in Tanzania, UK-based private company Kabanga Nickel said on Monday, as the world’s largest miner seeks to expand its portfolio in commodities deemed key to the green energy transition.

BHP cuts more jobs at water-stressed Chilean copper mine

BHP Group took another step in downsizing its smallest copper mine in Chile as it approaches the expiry of permits and grapples to regain access to underground water supplies.

Other news

1) Day of Action against mining in Portugal, 28 January 2022

Under the current Mining Development Plan, around 25% of Portugal is under threat. Natural Wildlife sanctuaries, biosphere reserves, protected zones, tourist areas and fully populated cities are part of the plan and will be the victims of the Eurofever for the white gold: Lithium. However, Lithium is actually used to camouflage the extraction of more than 30 minerals under the disguise of a “green and ecological” transition.

2) News about Cerrejon Coal

OECD accepts complaints against Anglo American, BHP and Glencore at Cerrejón

The National Contact Points of Switzerland, Australia and the United Kingdom admitted the complaints submitted by various Colombian and international organisations against multinational companies Glencore, Anglo American and BHP, who own the Cerrejón Coal Company. Over the last two decades they have been profiting from Latin America’s largest open-cast coal mine, in La Guajira, Colombia.

Human rights and environmental harms at Cerrejon

Multiple National Contact Points (NCPs) of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) have been investigating three international mining giants (BHP, Anglo American and Glencore) and Ireland’s state-owned energy provider, the ESB, over serious human rights abuses and devastating environmental pollution at the Cerrejón coal mine in Colombia. On 10 January 2022 the Swiss, Australian and UK NCPs all decided that our complaints against the parent companies (BHP, Anglo American and Glencore) deal with a credible issue and should progress. The Irish NCP has yet to deliver its initial assessment of ESB and also the Dublin-based sales arm of the Cerrejón mine, CMC.

Glencore’s deal for giant Colombian coal mine ends up costing much less

Glencore Plc’s purchase of a giant Colombian coal mine has cost the commodities trader and mining powerhouse much less than initially thought after prices of the fuel surged. The company on Tuesday said it completed the acquisition of the Cerrejon mine, following a deal struck in June to take full control of the asset from partners BHP Group and Anglo American Plc. At the time, Glencore agreed to pay about $588 million, while also taking cash flows for the year. It estimated a final cost of roughly $230 million.

3) News about Antofagasta

Biden administration kills Antofagasta’s Minnesota copper project

The U.S. Department of the Interior cancelled two mineral leases for Antofagasta Plc’s proposed Twin Metals copper and nickel mine in Minnesota, effectively killing the project and handing a major win to environmentalists.

Antofagasta says Chile water shortage to hit 2022 production

Chilean miner Antofagasta is expecting annual copper production for 2022 to be below last year’s levels, as operations continue to be impacted by the home country’s longest drought in decades.

4) Rio Tinto in the news

Serbia scraps spatial plan for Rio Tinto’s lithium mining project, all permits

The Government of Serbia annulled its decree on the spatial plan for Rio Tinto’s lithium mine and processing plant, and fulfilled everything that environmentalist organizations demanded, Prime Minister Ana Brnabić said.

Rio Tinto and Panguna stakeholders start assessment on mine damage

The mining giant Rio Tinto has told a Bougainvillean group it should have made an earlier assessment of the damage their mine at Panguna had caused.

Film on Bougainville Wins International Awards

The chillingly beautiful film Ophir, about the Bougainville Crisis and its aftermath, has screened at almost 100 festivals across 45 countries since its release in 2020. It’s also won 23 awards, the first of which was the top prize at the Pacific Documentary Film Festival in Tahiti, an achievement French writer and director Olivier Pollet holds dear.

Rio Tinto and Mongolia settle feud over Oyu Tolgoi copper mine

Rio Tinto Plc and the Mongolian government said they have reached an agreement to end a long-running dispute over the $6.93 billion expansion project for the Oyu Tolgoi copper-gold mining project.

Mongolian herders protest at Rio Tinto’s Oyu Tolgoi mine

Traditional herders from Khanbogd, Mongolia, held a demonstration at the gates of the Rio-Tinto controlled Oyu Tolgoi copper-gold mine on Tuesday 11 January, 2022.

5) Chile: the advance of the toxic mountains

There are 742 tailings deposits in Chile, with toxic waste containing arsenic, lead, mercury, cyanide salts and chemicals produced in the process of mining accumulating to billions of tonnes. It is estimated that the equivalent to 2,572,263 tonnes of tailings are deposited every 30 hours. It is predicted that by 2026 more than 915 million tonnes will be produced a year, a 74% increase in the creation of tailings compared to 2014, which saw 525 million tonnes a year.

6) Peru: the damage done by Antamina

Puerto Huarmey: how fishes, sea lions, and people coexisted until the arrival of Antamina. (BHP and Glencore are both involved at Antamina.)

7) Bullish investors add $90bn to top 50 biggest mining companies

The MINING.COM Top 50* most valuable mining companies pared much of the losses suffered in the third quarter, adding a combined $86.3 billion in market capitalization over the final three months of 2021, as investors in the sector position for what should be another strong year for the industry.

8) IndustriALL joins working group to develop mining standard

IndustriALL Global Union has joined the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) mining working group, established to develop a GRI mining standard.

9) A humble TB treatment centre weathers the Covid storm

According to the ‘TB and Poverty’ report prepared by Dr Manan Ganguli in early 2021, “Negligence leading to a person’s death constitutes a crime. This document questions whether the contraction of tuberculosis by poorly nourished people in marginalized communities with no choice but to breathe in toxic dusts and fumes from mines and industries springing up next to their houses, and by young, unskilled migrant workers forced to live in cramped conditions near their places, constitutes such a crime; whether exorbitant medical fees, unnecessary tests and medicines charged by doctors in private clinics, (followed by) reference to government TB centres for standard treatment free of charge, and, whether causing delays in initiating standard anti-TB treatment that leads to drug resistance — amounts to criminal negligence.”

10) Latin American Church groups unite around demand for a post-extractivist economy

More than 100 Catholic Religious Congregations and Conferences from seven countries signed a manifesto in which they demand a post-extractivist model of development which respects people and the environment.

11) Fossil Free Careers

Our friends at People & Planet are calling on UK University Careers Departments to end recruitment pipelines into the oil, gas, and mining industries through their Fossil Free Careers campaign. Over the past year, we’ve worked with them to develop a list of the 250 biggest players in extractivism. When we say the universities should end their relationships with the oil, gas, and mining industries, these are the specific companies we are talking about.

12) People’s Land Policy webinars

Webinars on participatory democracy, with contributions from LMN Education Coordinator Kerima Mohideen and LMN associate member Gabriela Sarmet.

13) LMN at COP26

Online event – We can’t mine our way out of the climate crisis: achieving a just energy future for all

Frontline communities, mineworkers and environmental justice activists explored the connections between their struggles for an inclusive just transition, to achieve a democratic and just renewable energy future for all. The session focused on actions, pathways and policies to highlight the need to join in solidarity across global renewable energy supply chains at COP26 and beyond.

Vocation for Justice: Listen for a Change

The Spring 2022 issue of the Columban Social Justice newsletter ‘Vocation for Justice’ is now available. It takes the general theme ‘Listen for a Change’ from a key theme of the campaigning around the United Nations COP26 climate conference in Glasgow last November. See article on Just Transition by LMN’s Co-chair Andy Whitmore on page 5.